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Courtyard Living was located in an old warehouse, where now a dozen small businesses were housed. She parked her car in the parking lot and got out. The warehouse used to be part of a candy factory, which had moved to another part of town fifteen years ago. She looked around. Someone was putting a display stand outside and carrying clay sculptures to place on top of it, and a wholesale clothes store was opening its doors, welcoming their first customers. It all looked very industrial chic and she liked it. Giving a new purpose to old factory buildings was a good thing. Better than to allow them to run down. She set foot for the landscaping place and as she walked in, several men dressed in green coveralls walked out, carrying gardening tools.

Once inside, she went in search of the owner, according to the website one Amabel Margarit. She found her in a cluttered office, her desk a big mess, papers covering every available surface, and a large whiteboard nailed to the wall with the weekly planning.

“Amabel Margarit?” she asked as she knocked politely. “My name is Odelia Poole, and I’m a reporter for theHampton Cove Gazette.”

“Oh, right, come on in. I have it here somewhere,” said Amabel, rooting through the documents on her desk and shoving a snake plant that had seen better days out of the way. “Your boss called me last week and I told him I hadn’t changed my mind—just hadn’t gotten round to it yet. Ah, here it is.” She produced a piece of paper, wiped off a few smudges of dirt, and proudly handed it to Odelia.

She then gave her a pleasant smile. Amabel was a sturdily built young woman, with dark hair and thick-rimmed glasses, and looked entirely too young to ever have known any member of the Baker family.

Odelia glanced at the piece of paper. It was the text for an ad in theGazette, along with a picture of a garden, presumably one Courtyard Living had worked on.

“Um, I’m actually not here for this,” she said, “but I’ll take it, of course.”

She looked up to see Amabel handing her a fifty-dollar bill.“Here. That should cover it, right?”

“Thanks. I’m actually looking into the murder of a man who used to work for you.”

Amabel did a double take and placed her hands to her chest.“Oh, my god. Who?”

“His name is Boyd Baker, and he died fifty-five years ago. But at the time he worked for this company.”

“Fifty-five years,” said the woman, adjusting her glasses. “I’m twenty-eight, Miss Poole.”

“I know. I just hoped you could point me in the right direction. Names of people he worked with, maybe. Addresses. Something.”

The young woman nodded. She darted a glance to a filing cabinet in a corner of the office. It was one of those old-fashioned sturdy metal things, that make a pleasant clunking sound when you slam the drawer home. She crouched down and opened the bottom drawer.“Now let me have a look-see. I took over Courtyard Living from my dad, who took over from his dad.”

“I’d hoped as much,” said Odelia gratefully.

“And any old personnel files my dad and granddad had, they kept in here. These days I keep everything in the computer, but if the old archive is still intact… Yes. Here we go. Boyd Baker.” She took out the file as Odelia’s heart made a little leap of excitement. She placed it on top of her desk and studied it for a moment. “So what do you want to know?”

“I’d like to know about his colleagues. Maybe some of them are still around.”

“Fifty-five years…” She studied a pink card, covered in near illegible writing.

“His daughter told me he and his colleagues used to hang out at a bar after work. The Rusty Beaver? It’s a flower shop now.”

“Yeah, that name rings a bell. Our workers changed venues since the olden days, though. Now they hang out at the Brimming Beaker, which is just around the corner.”

“Could I take a quick peek at Mr. Baker’s personnel file?”

“Oh, sure. Be my guest,” said Amabel, and handed her the file folder.

Odelia took a seat on the only chair that wasn’t covered with objects, and leafed through the contents of the folder. There wasn’t much of great significance there, as she’d feared. Boyd had started to work for Courtyard Living when he was eighteen, and had been an okay worker. And then, as she flipped a file that contained information about his paycheck, a scribbled note fell out. She picked it up and saw that it was some form of job assessment. In capital letters the words POLICE INTERVIEW had been written. It also contained a summary of the interview. Apparently Boyd had been accused by one of the company’s customers of absconding with valuables belonging to the family where he’d done a job. And whoever had written these notes had added GET RID OF HIM? and underlined it three times.

She looked up.“Who is Mrs. Clifford?” she asked. “Aurelia Clifford?”